Chaos Corona 13 for 3ds Max - Daily Builds Discussion

[romullus]

The roadmap was updated yesterday. I think folks who over the years has been asking for NPR rendering, might be very pleased with it.

Don´t forget: As different news sources told in the beginning of the year, Ondra joined another "project" - so that surely had an effect.

I didn't know that. Would you mind to share a link to those sources, please?

[Mr.White]

I didn't know that. Would you mind to share a link to those sources, please?

Yes, surely. It´s just three sources, there are many more.

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jakub-cech_ondra-karlik-joins-mode-maison-as-head-of-activity-7287820237947731968-bW-O
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/mode-maison_ondra-karlik-joins-mode-maison-as-head-of-activity-7287500536038187008-hCAM
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ondra-karlik-joins-mode-maison-140000277.html

[romullus]

Thank you!

[TomG]

The big pool if ideas is thinned out just because I haven't been updating it :) There are too many possible ideas that it would be counter productive to list them all, and confusing to list only a few. The best thing to refer to in place of that these days is the Ideas Portal, to see what is getting the most user votes, as that is a major guiding star in terms of things we consider for future versions (https://chaoscorona.ideas.aha.io/ ). So, that list is not a change in momentum for any reason, simply a change to it not getting updated :) Meantime I don't want to delete it until it gets cleared out.

[zaar]

Nice to see some updates! Surpriced and dissapointed not to see gaussian splats there. Like this is something that I really want to offer to my clients as soon as possible, and I see my self going elsewhere to experiment with this soon.

Toon... a bit baffled (and dissapointed in relation to other priorities) but also intrigued. I just held a class this week on how to take your corona project into arnold to render out toon lines to overlay and do "artistic" images in photoshop. Odd to see this after I've just told students, that even though lines rendering is not an uncommon requested in archviz, corona has always had it's focus on being a photo real camera that's easy to use. I know a lot of people will be happy about this. But I want my splats first :)

[TomG]

Splats are planned for 14, because there is still ongoing work there from the innovation and V-Ray teams, so rather than rush it into 13 it is better to a) take our time and b) when we release in 14 we'll catch whatever the latest wave of features and development is from Chaos overall, rather than release then have to update right away in the next version :)

[Marijan]

Any ideas when Porting Material and Render Dialog UIs to Qt could be implemented?
It's the most popular request in Corona Ideas Portal with almost twice as much votes comparing to Toon shading.

Recently, I worked on a project in V-Ray after many years of working with Corona.
The difference in the material editor response is significant, and consequently, the workflow and productivity is improved.
I don't want to diminish the value of toon shading, I know that some users have been wanting this feature for years
but improving material editor response could be great improvment in everyday work for all users.

[TomG]

We might see some initial / partial work on this for Corona 14, though 14 isn't fully planned out yet (and won't be until 13 is released). BTW, back when mapping out plans for 13 it was not that far ahead of Toon shading, and Toon shading also has a history dating back to 2016 or more on the forums that we also took into account :)

[pokoy]

We might see some initial / partial work on this for Corona 14, though 14 isn't fully planned out yet (and won't be until 13 is released). BTW, back when mapping out plans for 13 it was not that far ahead of Toon shading, and Toon shading also has a history dating back to 2016 or more on the forums that we also took into account :)

My 2 cents - even though Toon might be on the list for quite some time its availability will affect a smaller group, while a Qt port will benefit all users.

I think material/map UI components would be the most pressing as these are slowing down working with Corona the most, the render dialog can probably have less priority.
Is Scatter's modifier UI already ported?

[alexyork]

Agree. Not sure why something that's clearly well outside of Corona's photorealism modus operandi is taking priority over something (interface slowness) that affects quite literally every single Corona user in every single use session, no matter what you're doing with it. It's nice that Toon stuff is happening, but the priorities here are... strange. It currently sounds like it's not even a priority in 14 either but more of a starting point there for release more likely in 15? And toon stuff won't be any kind of innovation either, when it's in. It'll be catching up with other NPR engines from many years ago, so I don't really put it into an "innovative new tools" mindset. Doesn't make sense to me, sorry!

[TomG]

Toon was such a long, long standing request, the one usually trotted out to say "You never listen to us users! We've been asking for Toon for years!", it was top of the list on Aha for some time (back when decisions were being made for 13), plus Toon had a lot of work on it was done during the Rendathon last year so it already had a head start.

The Qt rewrite is a major project that will take a long time, which is why 14 is described as possibly having some initial version of it (e.g. rewriting the Corona Physical Material only, or some other such well-defined subset), and then we'll see incremental updates as we go, as it can't be fitted into a single release.

There are also things we have to do for Update 2 etc. that limit what we can work on for 13, which made Toon a viable option and Qt not so much.

[RecentSpacesSam]

I appreciate that software development isn't necessarily as straightforward as saying "just change it from A to B" but I'm curious to know if the QT re-write could be done in stages?

As others have mentioned the biggest impact would be the material editor change so even if just the CoronaPhysicalMtl was updated in 12u2 (or 13) and other parts of the UI followed in later versions this would already have a huge effect on productivity.

[pokoy]

I appreciate that software development isn't necessarily as straightforward as saying "just change it from A to B" but I'm curious to know if the QT re-write could be done in stages?

As others have mentioned the biggest impact would be the material editor change so even if just the CoronaPhysicalMtl was updated in 12u2 (or 13) and other parts of the UI followed in later versions this would already have a huge effect on productivity.

Side note, slightly related - not sure what's happening with LayerMtl but it looks like adding a new Layer to it will update all layers (probably registering/re-ordering anim tracks for all 10 layers...?) adding a lot of overhead and time until you can work again.

[TomG]

We're already well underway with 13, which is why the Qt part won't appear in it (barring something planned miraculously taking a lot less time to implement and test.... I mean everything is just a plan :) But Qt is not in the plan for 13), and this idea of doing it in stages is why it's called an "initial" version on 14.

As a note, it is not yet known or proven how much, if any, of a benefit would come from doing it, which is also why 14 will not be the total rewrite, but some subset so that everything can be tested and checked. This will then inform future plans along those lines.

[dj_buckley]

For once in recent times, i'm not complaining.  Really looking forward to 13 now that toon is being implemented.  However I will repeat, I don't think anyone wants a fully comprehensive 'toon' shader - just a better implementation of CoronaWires.  Personally for me better Wires is a higher priority than faster UI.  I can currently use the UI, even if it's slow, it's not stopping me doing anything, it's just making me do it slower.  Not having properly behaving wires is stopping an integral part of my workflow that up until now, I've had to find shoddy workarounds for.

Whilst one of Corona's aims is photorealism, the first sentence on it's product page is this "Chaos® Corona is the only renderer created specifically for high-end architectural visualization." - so whilst Toon/Wires aren't a tool aimed at photorealism, they are an integral part of many architectural visualisation workflows.  Arch Viz goes beyond realism, so in my opinion if a piece of software is dedicated to 'arch viz' then it should have all the necessary tools inside of it to cover the full arch viz pipeline.

Someone also mentioned that it isn't 'innovation' and it's merely bringing Corona up to speed.  Again, personally, I'd rather be up to speed than behind.